MP All Models Apple Silicon Mac Pro, What To Expect? Worried as a Studio Ultra Buyer?

[Chevron]

Having ordered a Mac Studio Ultra that will arrive in late May or early June, I am mildly concerned that a new Apple Silicon Mac Pro is soon to arrive that will make me regret buying the Studio Ultra.

I am not in need of the PCIe slots, and can make a Mac Studio work with a few peripherals for my needs. TB hub and NVMe enclosure etc. In reality the Studio will be an awesome machine for me I am sure.

Apart from, that I 'almost' bought a Macbook Pro M1 Max, and if I had I would have regretted it once I'd seen the Ultra. Is it going to come to pass when the Mac Pro has been released the same regret?

In reality, the Studio Ultra will be an awesome machine for me I am sure, but if an M1 Mega Mac Pro with 40 Cores and priced a few $1,000s more hits this summer, the shine will be taken off.....

I know, I know, I know, buy the machine that is available now and make the most of it, and don't look back - just doing my due diligence

 

[theluggage]

Nobody can really answer this, because although Apple have teased a new Mac Pro, they are going to pay “I’ve got a secret!” until the last minute. The Studio launch and demise of the 5k iMac showed how reliable rumours are…

Given that, though - is money no object?

Given that the Studio has introduced new “pro-class” Macs at $2000 and $4000 starting prices, I seriously doubt that the new Mac Pro is going to be less than the current $6000… and bear in mind that the current $6000 MP is a fairly feeble spec with the performance of a top-end iMac, so you’re really paying for expandability.

Just speculating, but that $6000 Mac Pro could be some sort of chassis/rack with a single M1 Ultra module and slots for you to add additional Ultra modules at several thousand bucks a pop. If there’s going to be a quad-M1-max chip then that’s likely to be a $$$$ step-up from the Ultra. (The higher-spec Xeon W chips for the pro have an end-user price of about $7000 and Apple have no particular motive to undercut that for a chip they will probably claim is twice as fast).

 

[Chevron]

Nobody can really answer this, because although Apple have teased a new Mac Pro, they are going to pay “I’ve got a secret!” until the last minute. The Studio launch and demise of the 5k iMac showed how reliable rumours are…

Given that, though - is money no object?

Given that the Studio has introduced new “pro-class” Macs at $2000 and $4000 starting prices, I seriously doubt that the new Mac Pro is going to be less than the current $6000… and bear in mind that the current $6000 MP is a fairly feeble spec with the performance of a top-end iMac, so you’re really paying for expandability.

Just speculating, but that $6000 Mac Pro could be some sort of chassis/rack with a single M1 Ultra module and slots for you to add additional Ultra modules at several thousand bucks a pop. If there’s going to be a quad-M1-max chip then that’s likely to be a $$$$ step-up from the Ultra. (The higher-spec Xeon W chips for the pro have an end-user price of about $7000 and Apple have no particular motive to undercut that for a chip they will probably claim is twice as fast).

Thanks for the reply and perspective, that all makes a lot of sense. Appreciate the speculation too.

I wouldn't say money is no object, but I am fine with paying for a super-powerful machine and I'd prefer it be a machine that I would keep for a number of years. No reason right now that wouldn't be the Studio Ultra, but there is this lingering thought about an AS Mac Pro. I'm sure you understand....

I actually find the pricing on the Studio very reasonable considering the power and ports, even the internal storage and RAM pricing is not too bad. Shame it is not expandable though, but I understand why not.

Of course, the prudent thing to do would be to wait. I figure I could cancel my Ultra order and do that, but I am on the fence about that. My current Mac is still very workable but there is no doubt the speed boost of the Ultra would pay dividends in my every day working life....

 

[theluggage]

Of course, the prudent thing to do would be to wait. I figure I could cancel my Ultra order and do that, but I am on the fence about that. My current Mac is still very workable but there is no doubt the speed boost of the Ultra would pay dividends in my every day working life....

If you wanted to, you could wait until WWDC in June - you’re not going to get your studio much before that anyway, and if you re-order, the delivery times should have gone down by then. If there’s going to be some fancy multi-SoC Pro with developer implications then WWDC could be the time to launch it. However, a MP launch could happen as late as November and still be within Apples 2 year transition - and nobody is really going to hold them to that. Leave it too long and there will be rumours of the M2 Ultra to deal with.

Also - if the “quad” M1 arrives, it will “only” be two Ultras welded together - i.e. 40 CPU cores, 128 GPU cores, with the same single core performance, which means that, unless your software scales well to that number of cores, you will get diminishing returns on performance. That’s already somewhat true of ultra vs. max. So you really need to research how your software is likely to perform, also whether you need the amount of RAM that’s likely to come with the Quad (128GB?) The next all-round performance boost will come with the M2 series and, even if the base M2 Air shows up soon, you’d expect the pro, max and ultra versions to lag 6 months or so behind it, just as the M1 series did.

Like it or not, whatever you buy, M1 will be followed by M2 and that will be followed by M3 - and (even in a Mac Pro) you’ll not be able to upgrade the CPU, GPU or main RAM.

 

[Chevron]

If you wanted to, you could wait until WWDC in June - you’re not going to get your studio much before that anyway, and if you re-order, the delivery times should have gone down by then. If there’s going to be some fancy multi-SoC Pro with developer implications then WWDC could be the time to launch it. However, a MP launch could happen as late as November and still be within Apples 2 year transition - and nobody is really going to hold them to that. Leave it too long and there will be rumours of the M2 Ultra to deal with.

Also - if the “quad” M1 arrives, it will “only” be two Ultras welded together - i.e. 40 CPU cores, 128 GPU cores, with the same single core performance, which means that, unless your software scales well to that number of cores, you will get diminishing returns on performance. That’s already somewhat true of ultra vs. max. So you really need to research how your software is likely to perform, also whether you need the amount of RAM that’s likely to come with the Quad (128GB?) The next all-round performance boost will come with the M2 series and, even if the base M2 Air shows up soon, you’d expect the pro, max and ultra versions to lag 6 months or so behind it, just as the M1 series did.

Like it or not, whatever you buy, M1 will be followed by M2 and that will be followed by M3 - and (even in a Mac Pro) you’ll not be able to upgrade the CPU, GPU or main RAM.

Thank you for the perspective, very helpful. I am a mix engineer using Pro Toos, so multi-core performance is the more desirable.

I'm going to keep the order open, and keep my ear to the ground.

I see the WWDC is on June 7th this year, I know nothing about it really. Is it just a one-day event? So by the end of the day we would likely know if a Mac Pro is imminent? With pricing details?

 

[bsbeamer]

I am not in need of the PCIe slots, and can make a Mac Studio work with a few peripherals for my needs.

In reality, the Studio Ultra will be an awesome machine for me I am sure

Seems you answered your own concerns here.

I've made the decision to wait until I see the "entire" lineup before making a decision on which AS machine I might purchase in the future. It likely will not be the AS Mac Pro based on what I assume the price will be, but would be angry with a Studio purchase if it wasn't that far off on my budget and offered multiple times performance and options. As soon as delivery dates slipped to where they did, it made little sense to buy a Studio at this time just to be one of the "first" early adopters.

 

[Chevron]

Seems you answered your own concerns here.

I've made the decision to wait until I see the "entire" lineup before making a decision on which AS machine I might purchase in the future. It likely will not be the AS Mac Pro based on what I assume the price will be, but would be angry with a Studio purchase if it wasn't that far off on my budget and offered multiple times performance and options. As soon as delivery dates slipped to where they did, it made little sense to buy a Studio at this time just to be one of the "first" early adopters.

Not really, and I know the answer to what I am really asking is currently not possible. Is there a Mac Pro imminent that will make purchasing the Mac Studio Ultra regrettable?

There was for me this situation with the MacBook Pro M1 Max, I was thinking of buying, and only didn't as Pro Tools is not M1 native - so held off, and glad I did. Only considering now as Pro Tools is Monterey compatible, although not native but soon to be, and even under Rossetta 2 Pro Tools would be more powerful than my current machine.

I know the smart solution is to wait, but with a 2.5 month wait for Studio Ultra delivery, I can keep that happening whilst I research - which is exactly my intention here.....

 

[theluggage]

I see the WWDC is on June 7th this year, I know nothing about it really. Is it just a one-day event?

Unless you're a developer interested in the technical sessions, the relevant bit of WWDC is the "keynote" presentation that opens the conference and is addressed to a much wider audience (not really that different to the March 8th event).

Before some genius posts the usual spiel about "WWDC is a developers conference and they only announce software" - the only things certain to appear at WWDC 2021 are iOS 15 and MacOS 14 "Fruitvale BART station" (you heard it here first) - but the 2019 Mac Pro, 2017 iMac Pro and 2013 TrashCan Mac Pro were all previewed at WWDC keynotes (with, I think, starting prices but no detailed price lists) although they only went on sale later in the year.

Nothing is certain, but given Apple have teased that a Mac Pro is coming, a preview WWDC is a good bet. Next likelihood is October/November (September is almost always iPhone and services).

 

[bsbeamer]

There's a very very sketchy rumor on some video sites that Apple is going to NAB 2022 (officially starts April 23). If they do a pro-focused event associated with NAB, it would likely be offsite and filled with NDA's as several past events have been.

 

[Malus120]

I think @theluggage has already helped you work out the answer to your question but here's a checklist to help alleviate your apparent FOMO and or rather severe case of G.A.S. (Gear Acquisition Syndrome):

1. What are you actually going to use the computer for (just ProWorks?), and how well does it scale with both CPU and GPU compute? (Honestly speaking unless it scales linearly for both, even the Ultra may not be "worth it")
2. Where are your actual performance bottlenecks and how well does the Mac Studio address them vs a future Mac Pro (probably also useful to compare against the M1 Max/MBP)
3. Are you using your Mac to make money (ideally as your primary/a significant source of income if you're spending this much) and if so how long do you estimate it would take for the M1 Ultra to "pay for itself" vs the M1 Max, and then extrapolate that to an M1 "Omega" Mac Pro that costs at least another $2-3K on top (again, does your software really scale, and even if it does, is it really worth it?)
4. Why would you have regretted buying an M1 Max MBP? Is it because you can actually use the extra performance of the ultra? You don't actually need a laptop? Or do you just want the latest and greatest?

What I'm trying to get at here is, try to take the emotion out of the purchasing decision. Ask yourself what you need today, what you expect to need tomorrow, where your current performance bottlenecks are and what your budget is (or if money is no issue, should be based on the actual value it will generate.) If you can answer these questions you can hopefully make a purchase you won't regret (at least I know I did)

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

Having ordered a Mac Studio Ultra that will arrive in late May or early June, I am mildly concerned that a new Apple Silicon Mac Pro is soon to arrive that will make me regret buying the Studio Ultra.

I am not in need of the PCIe slots, and can make a Mac Studio work with a few peripherals for my needs. TB hub and NVMe enclosure etc. In reality the Studio will be an awesome machine for me I am sure.

Apart from, that I 'almost' bought a Macbook Pro M1 Max, and if I had I would have regretted it once I'd seen the Ultra. Is it going to come to pass when the Mac Pro has been released the same regret?

In reality, the Studio Ultra will be an awesome machine for me I am sure, but if an M1 Mega Mac Pro with 40 Cores and priced a few $1,000s more hits this summer, the shine will be taken off.....

I know, I know, I know, buy the machine that is available now and make the most of it, and don't look back - just doing my due diligence

the video benchmarks on the studio are bunk. I need slots and will not get a machine without slots.

for example, right now I’m the only person on the planet that got 8k hdmi-based tv/monitors working on a Mac. You can’t do it with apple hardware. but I did it with an AMD reference 6900 reference card, which is cheaper, faster, and having more modern port options than apple offerings In my Mac Pro. Also, performs better than the studio despite apples dubious limited situation benchmarks. And newer cards coming out will obviously be even faster.

a non-slot based machine is a non starter for real pro/enthusiasts.

the studio is a wonderful machine. And the question is, will that machine do what you need for its life time, un-upgraded? Because that machine is even less upgradable than the trash can Mac. No ram or internal storage Upgrades ever. And once I have over 64gb of ram I want ecc. The error rate on ram is now pretty crazy high with the tiny lithograohy. Anyway, for many people it will be a killer machine. But it is not even close to a Mac Pro replacement for me.

Humiliated 7.1

So let's do a little summary: No 8k HDMI based TV/monitors No large capacity internal storage (I have a 15.36TB U.2 NVME drive in my Mac Pro, and 20TB internal spinner for time machine, you cannot have either in a studio) No cards necessary for audio pros and many other pros No memory over...

forums.macrumors.com

it’s a Mac mini pro, not a Mac Pro mini.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

If you wanted to, you could wait until WWDC in June - you’re not going to get your studio much before that anyway, and if you re-order, the delivery times should have gone down by then. If there’s going to be some fancy multi-SoC Pro with developer implications then WWDC could be the time to launch it. However, a MP launch could happen as late as November and still be within Apples 2 year transition - and nobody is really going to hold them to that. Leave it too long and there will be rumours of the M2 Ultra to deal with.

Also - if the “quad” M1 arrives, it will “only” be two Ultras welded together - i.e. 40 CPU cores, 128 GPU cores, with the same single core performance, which means that, unless your software scales well to that number of cores, you will get diminishing returns on performance. That’s already somewhat true of ultra vs. max. So you really need to research how your software is likely to perform, also whether you need the amount of RAM that’s likely to come with the Quad (128GB?) The next all-round performance boost will come with the M2 series and, even if the base M2 Air shows up soon, you’d expect the pro, max and ultra versions to lag 6 months or so behind it, just as the M1 series did.

Like it or not, whatever you buy, M1 will be followed by M2 and that will be followed by M3 - and (even in a Mac Pro) you’ll not be able to upgrade the CPU, GPU or main RAM.

you are correct about the processor likely being 2 ultras. However, what we do not know is will it have slots or not. To me that is key.

if There are no slots, then it is just a question of cores. and I’m holding on to my 2019 for as long as I can, and likely finally dump apple with their long hostile (dont care about pros/enthusiast) stance. If it has slots, to me that is everything, and I likely will be upgrading. it will show apple learned something from its 2017 apology tour regarding not making a truly expandable Mac for pros, and is taking that market and it’s concerns seriously.

 

[clevins]

Not really, and I know the answer to what I am really asking is currently not possible. Is there a Mac Pro imminent

In the sense that it will ship this year, yes. It might be announced at WWDC in June. If not then, you're very likely looking at the October event.

that will make purchasing the Mac Studio Ultra regrettable?

Only you know your needs. At some point the price/performance ratio isn't worth if for a given use case. That is, if your use case isn't really helped if the Pro is 4x the speed of the Ultra, then spending more would be silly. If your use case is 'I can profitably use every bit of speed I can get and I'd buy the $50k Mac Pro if I could' then I'd wait to see.

So much of this is why you want the extra performance... just because it's more or because your work demands it or...? There's no wrong answer there.

 

[MayaUser]

Having ordered a Mac Studio Ultra that will arrive in late May or early June, I am mildly concerned that a new Apple Silicon Mac Pro is soon to arrive that will make me regret buying the Studio Ultra.

I am not in need of the PCIe slots, and can make a Mac Studio work with a few peripherals for my needs. TB hub and NVMe enclosure etc. In reality the Studio will be an awesome machine for me I am sure.

Apart from, that I 'almost' bought a Macbook Pro M1 Max, and if I had I would have regretted it once I'd seen the Ultra. Is it going to come to pass when the Mac Pro has been released the same regret?

In reality, the Studio Ultra will be an awesome machine for me I am sure, but if an M1 Mega Mac Pro with 40 Cores and priced a few $1,000s more hits this summer, the shine will be taken off.....

I know, I know, I know, buy the machine that is available now and make the most of it, and don't look back - just doing my due diligence

if you are gpu monster, then wait for the mac pro , or buy now the studio and then exchange it to the mac pro later in this year or 2023 when it will be released

 

[Analog Kid]

I’ve been wondering about the same questions that @Chevron is asking.

Actually, the bigger question for me is around displays. The sweet spot for me is probably between the Studio and a reduced cost Pro XDR, or possibly a Pro XDR with more dimming zones.

What I'm trying to get at here is, try to take the emotion out of the purchasing decision. Ask yourself what you need today, what you expect to need tomorrow, where your current performance bottlenecks are and what your budget is (or if money is no issue, should be based on the actual value it will generate.) If you can answer these questions you can hopefully make a purchase you won't regret (at least I know I did)

While I’d ordinarily agree with this perspective, the lead times change things significantly. If I could have the Studio I want delivered tomorrow, I’d order it now and probably be perfectly satisfied while I get a few months of use out of it waiting to see what big iron hits the floor at the keynote knowing I probably won’t need it. If WWDC were next week, I’d wait to see what’s unveiled and make a decision with all cards on the table.

The current situation is kind of the worst of both those worlds. I don’t get the months of use, I probably won’t see what’s coming a few weeks later to make an optimized decision. I could wait until WWDC and assume lead times will come in over that time, but there’s no guarantee of it so I’d likely order a Studio in June and see it August/Sept.

What I’ll probably end up doing is order in a couple weeks, putting my delivery date firmly into June. If things go faster than expected and the system arrives before the keynote, then I don’t think it’ll really make a practical difference. I’ll probably order it with the Studio display, and if something better comes along add it as a second display.

Just speculating, but that $6000 Mac Pro could be some sort of chassis/rack with a single M1 Ultra module and slots for you to add additional Ultra modules at several thousand bucks a pop.

I’ve been thinking the same thing. Cluster in a box with M1-Ultra blades. I’m not sure where the trade off curve starts to level out between an integrated system and that kind of distributed computing, but I have to think 128GB of RAM, 20 cores and 64 GPU cores can do a lot of work and minimize the amount of data traffic across the inter blade network.

I haven’t seen much in the way of benchmarks on training deep learning networks with the neural accelerators, but presumably that could be scaled out as well.

Absolutely not what I need, but would be really cool to see. As it is, the MacPro has been trying to straddle that line between workstation and compute farm— the Studio handles the workstation bit quite handily.

MacOS used to have good support for this kind of cluster computing, back in the Xserve days. Any idea if its still well maintained?

 

[Chevron]

Thanks guys, I am not in need of help making a decision on which machine is good for me.

I don't follow release cycles or Apple's patterns for release, so I am more curious if there was knowledge of when an AS Mac Pro is likely to be released, what it may look like and any pricing info - as this site is called Mac Rumors after all

Of course, I totally realise this is likely unknown, but thought to ask anyway.

While I’d ordinarily agree with this perspective, the lead times change things significantly. If I could have the Studio I want delivered tomorrow, I’d order it now and probably be perfectly satisfied while I get a few months of use out of it waiting to see what big iron hits the floor at the keynote knowing I probably won’t need it. If WWDC were next week, I’d wait to see what’s unveiled and make a decision with all cards on the table.

Analog Kid added a very good point, that the lead times make it a harder call and if I could get a Studio delivered within a week I wouldn't be asking the question about the Mac Pro.

 

[ZombiePhysicist]

Thanks guys, I am not in need of help making a decision on which machine is good for me.

I don't follow release cycles or Apple's patterns for release, so I am more curious if there was knowledge of when an AS Mac Pro is likely to be released, what it may look like and any pricing info - as this site is called Mac Rumors after all

Of course, I totally realise this is likely unknown, but thought to ask anyway.



Analog Kid added a very good point, that the lead times make it a harder call and if I could get a Studio delivered within a week I wouldn't be asking the question about the Mac Pro.

wwdc in June is a likely announcement. Availability around December if the pattern for previous Mac Pro announcements hold.

‘’pricing is likely to be similar to current Mac Pro, I fear.

 

[clevins]

Yeah, there's never anything firm on announces, but an announce or a preview in June is likely. I don't think they'll announce too far in advance of release or they undercut their existing Mac Pro sales.

In general, Apple hardware gets 3 events per year: A Spring event, the iphone release in September and an iPad/Mac/other stuff in October. WWDC usually does NOT see hardware releases the last few years but they could do a MP announce here since it's the last big domino to fall in the AS transition.

PS: While you say you don't need help selecting a machine... i'm a little confiused. If the Pro was released at the end of the year and you had your Pro in June, would you regret it? I mean, if so, that implies you can use the Pro.. in which case I'd wait if your current hardware lets you. On the other hand, you could use a Studio fr 6 months and sell it for a pretty good fraction of the New price. The only weirdness happens if the Pro ships in June or July. In your shoes, I'd keep an eye on the rumors about the Pro release date and keep your eye on the delivery date of the Studio for new orders. If the delivery dates get closer the order dates as we approach June, you could just cancel your order and see what happens at WWDC. No Pro? Just reorder.

 

[G46&Fbnth5]

Mac Studio with 64 core GPU and 128 GB of RAM is $5.800, so I don’t expect the Mac Pro to start below $7000/7500.

 

[NC12]

Nobody can really answer this, because although Apple have teased a new Mac Pro, they are going to pay “I’ve got a secret!” until the last minute. The Studio launch and demise of the 5k iMac showed how reliable rumours are…

Given that, though - is money no object?

Given that the Studio has introduced new “pro-class” Macs at $2000 and $4000 starting prices, I seriously doubt that the new Mac Pro is going to be less than the current $6000… and bear in mind that the current $6000 MP is a fairly feeble spec with the performance of a top-end iMac, so you’re really paying for expandability.

Just speculating, but that $6000 Mac Pro could be some sort of chassis/rack with a single M1 Ultra module and slots for you to add additional Ultra modules at several thousand bucks a pop. If there’s going to be a quad-M1-max chip then that’s likely to be a $$$$ step-up from the Ultra. (The higher-spec Xeon W chips for the pro have an end-user price of about $7000 and Apple have no particular motive to undercut that for a chip they will probably claim is twice as fast).

Maybe it would be a tray system like the 2nd Gen Mac Pros. You could possible swap out a tray with an older M1 chip on it for a newer one when the M2 or M3 come out, it would probably be for a hefty price tag but we would get upgradability

 

[edanuff]

I think the simplest question for folks in this situation is going to be to look at pricing. Apple is extremely focused on priced-based segmentation these days. If you want to spend less than $6000 and you don't need expandability, get a Studio, else you probably need to get a PC. If you want to spend more than $6000, wait and see what the Pro looks like.