I received my Studio Friday. I purchased the base model and the studio monitor. The machine is amazing. The sound from the monitor is crystal clear and crisp. The SSD speed is fastest I have ever had so far. I am “floored” by the performance. I don’t do enough video work to justify the ultra. The MAX is perfect for my “print” and “photo” work.
I'd love to hear from someone who would lay down $2,000 extra just for a couple of Thunderbolt ports.
well... it was only $1400 ... and it gets you Thunderbolt ports AND twice the processing power. you don't think there are people for whom that would be worthwhile? You can't see where that would be lucrative without hearing from one of them?
I thought his comment was very clear. He mentioned buying it just for the TB ports in the front over USB 3.1 ports. In other words, if it were a Venn diagram, is there anyone at the intersection of wanting front-facing TB ports over USB 3.1 and not caring about the increased performance of the M1 Ultra chip?
Other articles have already posted the benchmarks for the M1 Ultra. Like all other M1 CPUs, the single core score is in the 1700 range. The M1 Ultra only excels with the multi-core score, over 20,000 in Geekbench 5. So unless your work specifically takes advantage of the multi-core tasks and video work, the Mac Studio would be a waste of money. The other difference between the base model studio and the Ultra CPU studio is the massive 2 pound heat sink required to keep the Ultra CPU cool. Shop wisely.
Everyone loves to claim how fast the M1 Macs are, but that is only the single core processes. Most Intel CPUs have faster multi-core scores than the M1, by a considerable margin. That is why Apple continued to sell the higher-end Intel Macs, also with dedicated GPUs that were faster than the M1. The M1 Pro and Max fix the limitations of the M1, and the Ultra has amazing multi-core scores. But if your work does not take advantage of the Pro, Max, and Ultra CPUs, you won't see any increase in performance because the single core score is the same as the M1 CPU. I wonder what the M2 will bring to the table?
That's a whole lot of wrong information to unpack.
1) Apple Silicon has been eating Intel's lunch for a long time. Even AnandTech has shown that Apple has had "desktop class" performance in tiny iPads for a very long time before the M1 was announced. This was inevitable and Intel has nothing on the board except a strong desire to best Apple Silicon at some future date.
2) macOS and Xcode make it very easy for even a simple app to work across multiple cores and this has been the case for a very long time.
3) And you din't even mention the power draw to compete with Apple Silicon. Besides the Intel i9 12900 costing $600 for just the chip, it uses many times the power to run it at the same speed as the M1 Ultra. This makes the Mac Studio a very economical buy not just in terms of time to compete jobs, but your TCO.
Apple is eating Intel's lunch and this will get people to switch and we could even see Apple move back into the server market because a 10,000 servers running a fraction of the power saves cost of energy and also allows for many more devices to be places closer together without needing to increase the power coming into the server room.
Does anyone else think that paying $400 for 32GB of RAM or $200 for 512GB of SSD space is a bit expensive? Like perhaps four times what the parts should cost? I guess we will just have to upgrade them our... oh snap!
No. It's not "a bit expensive". It's highway fucking robbery.
Even if it was reasonable NOW (it's not) it'll be absolutely outrageous in 2-3 years after purchase which is the point when most people realize there's not enough RAM or storage and upgrade.
The storage is the stupidest part. The VAST majority of people don't know how much storage they'll need in the future when they buy a computer. 512GB is rarely enough. And the only advantage of having the computer be a cute tiny little box is GONE when you've got to have an external box for the storage you'll need, the minuscule speed advantage of soldered storage is GONE when you're booting from that external box because the internal SSD is worn out.
Then don't buy it. I'm sure plenty of others will judging by how far backordered they are.
Seeing the two machines stacked made me think of some of the big clusters of the past, including those made with Macs (ex: Virginia Tech's Big Mac). This compact machine with it's built-in fast interconnects seems like a natural for that sort of super computer. Are clusters still being used for big computing projects?
My 2013 MacPro was spec-ed with the max memory (64GB) and 1TB SSD of the day and the 6 cores were the sweet spot for $$$/performance. It was upgraded to 128GB of Ram and a 2TB from OWC. But it is showing it's age. To upgrade to Big Sur I have to reinstall the 1TB Apple SSD so Apple can block the system from every upgrading again and then reinstall the 2TB SDD. and hopefully be able to upgrade the SSD. I have Some GEEK grandkids that will get it this summer. One of the two 2013 27" monitors died, so the other one will go along with the Trash can Mac.
To future proof my self, I ordered the Mac Studio Ultra with 128GB or Ram and a 4TB SSD. That device is twice the processors of my 14" MacBook Pro, twice the ram and the same size SSD. I ordered a new 27" monitor with Visa as that's how the current 27" monitors are mounted. I will get a second one later this year.
I keep my fully max loaded in every possible way Intel 16" MacBook Pro for legacy issues.
Other articles have already posted the benchmarks for the M1 Ultra. Like all other M1 CPUs, the single core score is in the 1700 range. The M1 Ultra only excels with the multi-core score, over 20,000 in Geekbench 5. So unless your work specifically takes advantage of the multi-core tasks and video work, the Mac Studio would be a waste of money. The other difference between the base model studio and the Ultra CPU studio is the massive 2 pound heat sink required to keep the Ultra CPU cool. Shop wisely.
Everyone loves to claim how fast the M1 Macs are, but that is only the single core processes. Most Intel CPUs have faster multi-core scores than the M1, by a considerable margin. That is why Apple continued to sell the higher-end Intel Macs, also with dedicated GPUs that were faster than the M1. The M1 Pro and Max fix the limitations of the M1, and the Ultra has amazing multi-core scores. But if your work does not take advantage of the Pro, Max, and Ultra CPUs, you won't see any increase in performance because the single core score is the same as the M1 CPU. I wonder what the M2 will bring to the table?
That's a whole lot of wrong information to unpack.
1) Apple Silicon has been eating Intel's lunch for a long time. Even AnandTech has shown that Apple has had "desktop class" performance in tiny iPads for a very long time before the M1 was announced. This was inevitable and Intel has nothing on the board except a strong desire to best Apple Silicon at some future date.
2) macOS and Xcode make it very easy for even a simple app to work across multiple cores and this has been the case for a very long time.
3) And you din't even mention the power draw to compete with Apple Silicon. Besides the Intel i9 12900 costing $600 for just the chip, it uses many times the power to run it at the same speed as the M1 Ultra. This makes the Mac Studio a very economical buy not just in terms of time to compete jobs, but your TCO.
Apple is eating Intel's lunch and this will get people to switch and we could even see Apple move back into the server market because a 10,000 servers running a fraction of the power saves cost of energy and also allows for many more devices to be places closer together without needing to increase the power coming into the server room.
The storage is the stupidest part. The VAST majority of people don't know how much storage they'll need in the future when they buy a computer. 512GB is rarely enough. And the only advantage of having the computer be a cute tiny little box is GONE when you've got to have an external box for the storage you'll need, the minuscule speed advantage of soldered storage is GONE when you're booting from that external box because the internal SSD is worn out.
Get back to us when this actually happens and when that happens at some far down the road future date then just replace the SSD if you're some oddball that's still using a first generation Mac Studio which will by then be archaically slow in comparison to the Apple Watch's performance.
These computers are not meant for the vast majority of people. These computers are meant for people who know what they are doing and what they want. The only question these people might have is when the ASi Mac Pro is coming out vs the projects they need to do or what config to do. The people who are running these computers for video, will always need external storage as even 8TB will not be enough. Even maxing out the storage in the current Mac Pro will not be enough. These people have already bought what they need, despite the complaints. Time is money. This stuff gets written off long before any hard drive problems.
Seeing the two machines stacked made me think of some of the big clusters of the past, including those made with Macs (ex: Virginia Tech's Big Mac). This compact machine with it's built-in fast interconnects seems like a natural for that sort of super computer. Are clusters still being used for big computing projects?
Single Mac studio ultra is 21 teraflops Big Mac with 1100 G5 dual core machines was 17 teraflops in 2003.
For about the same budget you could buy 500 fully loaded machines and have a million dollars left over to connect.
Which would be 2000 efficiency cores. 8000 performance cores 16,000 neural cores and 32,000 Gpu cores. 64 Tb of memory and 4Pb of storage.
But it’s not making the top 10 maybe not even top 100
Does anyone else think that paying $400 for 32GB of RAM or $200 for 512GB of SSD space is a bit expensive? Like perhaps four times what the parts should cost? I guess we will just have to upgrade them our... oh snap!
No. It's not "a bit expensive". It's highway fucking robbery.
Even if it was reasonable NOW (it's not) it'll be absolutely outrageous in 2-3 years after purchase which is the point when most people realize there's not enough RAM or storage and upgrade.
The storage is the stupidest part. The VAST majority of people don't know how much storage they'll need in the future when they buy a computer. 512GB is rarely enough. And the only advantage of having the computer be a cute tiny little box is GONE when you've got to have an external box for the storage you'll need, the minuscule speed advantage of soldered storage is GONE when you're booting from that external box because the internal SSD is worn out.
It looks like you forgot to share links to comparable spec upgrades by other companies...
Oh, wait. Someone else here already did that a few comments above yours, except those still aren't quite to the caliber of what Apple offers.
This post maybe a little out of topic, but I noticed some benchmarks for Mac Pro's with 12th Gen Intel processors. From what I remember of the keynote, Apple announced that the next step in the transition was the Mac Pro, but maybe there will be one more update for the current Mac Pro with Intel latest processors.
OK stop defending Apple on price gouging. Let's look at the obvious product that shows this. The Apple monitors, what does the stand cost????????? Also the wheels for the Mac Pro??????????? That is ridiculous and I do not have to be a parts cost expert. For the price of the product these features should be thrown in.
Does anyone else think that paying $400 for 32GB of RAM or $200 for 512GB of SSD space is a bit expensive? Like perhaps four times what the parts should cost? I guess we will just have to upgrade them our... oh snap!
No. It's not "a bit expensive". It's highway fucking robbery.
Even if it was reasonable NOW (it's not) it'll be absolutely outrageous in 2-3 years after purchase which is the point when most people realize there's not enough RAM or storage and upgrade.
The storage is the stupidest part. The VAST majority of people don't know how much storage they'll need in the future when they buy a computer. 512GB is rarely enough. And the only advantage of having the computer be a cute tiny little box is GONE when you've got to have an external box for the storage you'll need, the minuscule speed advantage of soldered storage is GONE when you're booting from that external box because the internal SSD is worn out.
You might want to actually do a 5 minutes of research before thinking you know what you're writing about.
OK stop defending Apple on price gouging. Let's look at the obvious product that shows this. The Apple monitors, what does the stand cost????????? Also the wheels for the Mac Pro??????????? That is ridiculous and I do not have to be a parts cost expert. For the price of the product these features should be thrown in.
The argument “I don’t want to pay extra so they should be included” shows you are definitely not an expert in “parts cost” but you don’t even understand basic economics.
I just bought a $200 wrench, but that’s foolish to you since you can the “same wrench for $10 at Harbor Freight. Who cares if the HF wrench won’t fit where I need it to because they use inferior quality metal in their forging process.
OK stop defending Apple on price gouging. Let's look at the obvious product that shows this. The Apple monitors, what does the stand cost????????? Also the wheels for the Mac Pro??????????? That is ridiculous and I do not have to be a parts cost expert. For the price of the product these features should be thrown in.
The argument “I don’t want to pay extra so they should be included” shows you are definitely not an expert in “parts cost” but you don’t even understand basic economics.
I just bought a $200 wrench, but that’s foolish to you since you can the “same wrench for $10 at Harbor Freight. Who cares if the HF wrench won’t fit where I need it to because they use inferior quality metal in their forging process.
Basic economics show that you can buy a high quality monitor WITH a height adjustable stand included for far less that $1500. Leave it to Apple to charge a lot extra for something that should have been included.
I'm not a tool guy, but how does the quality of the metal of the tool affect whether the tool fits or not?
OK stop defending Apple on price gouging. Let's look at the obvious product that shows this. The Apple monitors, what does the stand cost????????? Also the wheels for the Mac Pro??????????? That is ridiculous and I do not have to be a parts cost expert. For the price of the product these features should be thrown in.
The argument “I don’t want to pay extra so they should be included” shows you are definitely not an expert in “parts cost” but you don’t even understand basic economics.
I just bought a $200 wrench, but that’s foolish to you since you can the “same wrench for $10 at Harbor Freight. Who cares if the HF wrench won’t fit where I need it to because they use inferior quality metal in their forging process.
Basic economics show that you can buy a high quality monitor WITH a height adjustable stand included for far less that $1500. Leave it to Apple to charge a lot extra for something that should have been included.
I'm not a tool guy, but how does the quality of the metal of the tool affect whether the tool fits or not?
1) "Basic economics" explains the law of supply and demand. You'd be wise to learn and understand it. If you can find the same (or better quality) monitor for less money then Apple has priced their monitor too high for the market. I don't think the $1599 Studio Display is priced excessively, but what 27" 5K display with the same features and color accuracy do you have in mind for less money in this scenario?
2) If you're asking how the quality of a metal can allow its walls to be thinner while being as strong or stronger than cheaper tools for accessing tighter spaces then you're not far from being a "tool guy" but also lacking basic, common understanding of how materials work. In terms of economics in this regard, a $200 wrench that will fit into a tighter spot can save a fair amount of time, effort, and aggravation of not having to remove many other components to fit that tool around hard to reach places, if it's possible at all.
I'd love to hear from someone who would lay down $2,000 extra just for a couple of Thunderbolt ports.
well... it was only $1400 ... and it gets you Thunderbolt ports AND twice the processing power. you don't think there are people for whom that would be worthwhile? You can't see where that would be lucrative without hearing from one of them?
Quoted text only mentions the ports, nothing about processing power.
Thanks captain obvious. That’s exactly the problem with the quoted text
I am not trying to be argumentative but look at this. Come on $6000 and $1000 for the stand. Did the price of aluminum go up or something. Just acknowledge that this is gouging and I will concede to the rest of your argument.
Comments
1) Apple Silicon has been eating Intel's lunch for a long time. Even AnandTech has shown that Apple has had "desktop class" performance in tiny iPads for a very long time before the M1 was announced. This was inevitable and Intel has nothing on the board except a strong desire to best Apple Silicon at some future date.
2) macOS and Xcode make it very easy for even a simple app to work across multiple cores and this has been the case for a very long time.
3) And you din't even mention the power draw to compete with Apple Silicon. Besides the Intel i9 12900 costing $600 for just the chip, it uses many times the power to run it at the same speed as the M1 Ultra. This makes the Mac Studio a very economical buy not just in terms of time to compete jobs, but your TCO.
Apple is eating Intel's lunch and this will get people to switch and we could even see Apple move back into the server market because a 10,000 servers running a fraction of the power saves cost of energy and also allows for many more devices to be places closer together without needing to increase the power coming into the server room.
To future proof my self, I ordered the Mac Studio Ultra with 128GB or Ram and a 4TB SSD. That device is twice the processors of my 14" MacBook Pro, twice the ram and the same size SSD. I ordered a new 27" monitor with Visa as that's how the current 27" monitors are mounted. I will get a second one later this year.
I keep my fully max loaded in every possible way Intel 16" MacBook Pro for legacy issues.
M1 Ultra Mac Studio - Benchmarks & Thermals (The TRUTH!) - YouTube
Oh, wait. Someone else here already did that a few comments above yours, except those still aren't quite to the caliber of what Apple offers.
MacPro7,1 - Geekbench Browser
iMacPro1,1 - Geekbench Browser
iMacPro1,1 - Geekbench Browser
MacPro7,1 - Geekbench Browser
The SSD in the Mac Studio is SOCKETED. https://www.macrumors.com/2022/03/20/mac-studio-ssd-may-be-upgradeable/
It won't be long before someone (Apple or 3rd party) offers upgrades.
I just bought a $200 wrench, but that’s foolish to you since you can the “same wrench for $10 at Harbor Freight. Who cares if the HF wrench won’t fit where I need it to because they use inferior quality metal in their forging process.
I'm not a tool guy, but how does the quality of the metal of the tool affect whether the tool fits or not?
2) If you're asking how the quality of a metal can allow its walls to be thinner while being as strong or stronger than cheaper tools for accessing tighter spaces then you're not far from being a "tool guy" but also lacking basic, common understanding of how materials work. In terms of economics in this regard, a $200 wrench that will fit into a tighter spot can save a fair amount of time, effort, and aggravation of not having to remove many other components to fit that tool around hard to reach places, if it's possible at all.