Tuesday, March 8th 2022
Apple Unveils M1 Ultra, the World's Most Powerful Chip For a Personal Computer
Apple today announced M1 Ultra, the next giant leap for Apple silicon and the Mac. Featuring UltraFusion — Apple's innovative packaging architecture that interconnects the die of two M1 Max chips to create a system on a chip (SoC) with unprecedented levels of performance and capabilities — M1 Ultra delivers breathtaking computing power to the new Mac Studio while maintaining industry-leading performance per watt.
The new SoC consists of 114 billion transistors, the most ever in a personal computer chip. M1 Ultra can be configured with up to 128 GB of high-bandwidth, low-latency unified memory that can be accessed by the 20-core CPU, 64-core GPU and 32-core Neural Engine, providing astonishing performance for developers compiling code, artists working in huge 3D environments that were previously impossible to render, and video professionals who can transcode video to ProRes up to 5.6x faster than with a 28-core Mac Pro with Afterburner.
"M1 Ultra is another game changer for Apple silicon that once again will shock the PC industry. By connecting two M1 Max die with our UltraFusion packaging architecture, we're able to scale Apple silicon to unprecedented new heights," said Johny Srouji, Apple's senior vice president of Hardware Technologies. "With its powerful CPU, massive GPU, incredible Neural Engine, ProRes hardware acceleration and huge amount of unified memory, M1 Ultra completes the M1 family as the world's most powerful and capable chip for a personal computer."
Groundbreaking UltraFusion Architecture
The foundation for M1 Ultra is the extremely powerful and power-efficient M1 Max. To build M1 Ultra, the die of two M1 Max are connected using UltraFusion, Apple's custom-built packaging architecture. The most common way to scale performance is to connect two chips through a motherboard, which typically brings significant trade-offs, including increased latency, reduced bandwidth and increased power consumption. However, Apple's innovative UltraFusion uses a silicon interposer that connects the chips across more than 10,000 signals, providing a massive 2.5 TB/s of low-latency, inter-processor bandwidth — more than 4x the bandwidth of the leading multi-chip interconnect technology. This enables M1 Ultra to behave and be recognised by software as one chip, so developers don't need to rewrite code to take advantage of its performance. There's never been anything like it.
Unprecedented Performance and Power Efficiency
M1 Ultra features an extraordinarily powerful 20-core CPU with 16 high-performance cores and four high-efficiency cores. It delivers 90 per cent higher multithreaded performance than the fastest available 16-core PC desktop chip in the same power envelope. Additionally, M1 Ultra reaches the PC chip's peak performance using 100 fewer watts. That astounding efficiency means less energy is consumed and fans run quietly, even as apps like Logic Pro rip through demanding workflows, such as processing massive amounts of virtual instruments, audio plug-ins and effects.
For the most graphics-intensive needs, like 3D rendering and complex image processing, M1 Ultra has a 64-core GPU — 8x the size of M1 — delivering faster performance than even the highest-end PC GPU available while using 200 fewer watts of power.
Apple's unified memory architecture has also scaled up with M1 Ultra. Memory bandwidth is increased to 800 GB/s, more than 10x the latest PC desktop chip, and M1 Ultra can be configured with 128 GB of unified memory. Compared with the most powerful PC graphics cards that max out at 48 GB, nothing comes close to M1 Ultra for graphics memory to support enormous GPU-intensive workloads like working with extreme 3D geometry and rendering massive scenes.
The 32-core Neural Engine in M1 Ultra runs up to 22 trillion operations per second, speeding through the most challenging machine learning tasks. And, with double the media engine capabilities of M1 Max, M1 Ultra offers unprecedented ProRes video encode and decode throughput. In fact, the new Mac Studio with M1 Ultra can play back up to 18 streams of 8K ProRes 422 video — a feat no other chip can accomplish. M1 Ultra also integrates custom Apple technologies, such as a display engine capable of driving multiple external displays, integrated Thunderbolt 4 controllers and best-in-class security, including Apple's latest Secure Enclave, hardware-verified secure boot and runtime anti-exploitation technologies.
macOS and Apps Scale Up to M1 Ultra
Deep integration between hardware and software has always been at the heart of the Mac experience. macOS Monterey has been designed for Apple silicon, taking advantage of M1 Ultra's huge increases in CPU, GPU and memory bandwidth. Developer technologies like Metal let apps take full advantage of the new chip, and optimisations in Core ML utilise the new 32-core Neural Engine, so machine learning models run faster than ever.
Users have access to the largest collection of apps ever for Mac, including iPhone and iPad apps that can now run on Mac, and Universal apps that unlock the full power of the M1 family of chips. Apps that have not yet been updated to Universal will run seamlessly with Apple's Rosetta 2 technology.
Another Leap Forward in the Transition to Apple Silicon
Apple has introduced Apple silicon to nearly every Mac in the current line-up, and each new chip — M1, M1 Pro, M1 Max and now M1 Ultra — unleashes amazing capabilities for the Mac. M1 Ultra completes the M1 family of chips, powering the all-new Mac Studio, a high-performance desktop system with a re-imagined compact design made possible by the industry-leading performance per watt of Apple silicon.
Apple Silicon and the Environment
The energy efficiency of Apple's custom silicon helps Mac Studio use less power over its lifetime. In fact, while delivering extraordinary performance, Mac Studio consumes up to 1,000 kilowatt-hours less energy than that of a high-end PC desktop over the course of a year.
Today, Apple is carbon-neutral for global corporate operations, and by 2030, plans to have net-zero climate impact across the entire business, which includes manufacturing supply chains and all product life cycles. This means that every chip Apple creates, from design to manufacturing, will be 100 per cent carbon-neutral.
Source:
Apple
The new SoC consists of 114 billion transistors, the most ever in a personal computer chip. M1 Ultra can be configured with up to 128 GB of high-bandwidth, low-latency unified memory that can be accessed by the 20-core CPU, 64-core GPU and 32-core Neural Engine, providing astonishing performance for developers compiling code, artists working in huge 3D environments that were previously impossible to render, and video professionals who can transcode video to ProRes up to 5.6x faster than with a 28-core Mac Pro with Afterburner.
Groundbreaking UltraFusion Architecture
The foundation for M1 Ultra is the extremely powerful and power-efficient M1 Max. To build M1 Ultra, the die of two M1 Max are connected using UltraFusion, Apple's custom-built packaging architecture. The most common way to scale performance is to connect two chips through a motherboard, which typically brings significant trade-offs, including increased latency, reduced bandwidth and increased power consumption. However, Apple's innovative UltraFusion uses a silicon interposer that connects the chips across more than 10,000 signals, providing a massive 2.5 TB/s of low-latency, inter-processor bandwidth — more than 4x the bandwidth of the leading multi-chip interconnect technology. This enables M1 Ultra to behave and be recognised by software as one chip, so developers don't need to rewrite code to take advantage of its performance. There's never been anything like it.
Unprecedented Performance and Power Efficiency
M1 Ultra features an extraordinarily powerful 20-core CPU with 16 high-performance cores and four high-efficiency cores. It delivers 90 per cent higher multithreaded performance than the fastest available 16-core PC desktop chip in the same power envelope. Additionally, M1 Ultra reaches the PC chip's peak performance using 100 fewer watts. That astounding efficiency means less energy is consumed and fans run quietly, even as apps like Logic Pro rip through demanding workflows, such as processing massive amounts of virtual instruments, audio plug-ins and effects.
For the most graphics-intensive needs, like 3D rendering and complex image processing, M1 Ultra has a 64-core GPU — 8x the size of M1 — delivering faster performance than even the highest-end PC GPU available while using 200 fewer watts of power.
Apple's unified memory architecture has also scaled up with M1 Ultra. Memory bandwidth is increased to 800 GB/s, more than 10x the latest PC desktop chip, and M1 Ultra can be configured with 128 GB of unified memory. Compared with the most powerful PC graphics cards that max out at 48 GB, nothing comes close to M1 Ultra for graphics memory to support enormous GPU-intensive workloads like working with extreme 3D geometry and rendering massive scenes.
The 32-core Neural Engine in M1 Ultra runs up to 22 trillion operations per second, speeding through the most challenging machine learning tasks. And, with double the media engine capabilities of M1 Max, M1 Ultra offers unprecedented ProRes video encode and decode throughput. In fact, the new Mac Studio with M1 Ultra can play back up to 18 streams of 8K ProRes 422 video — a feat no other chip can accomplish. M1 Ultra also integrates custom Apple technologies, such as a display engine capable of driving multiple external displays, integrated Thunderbolt 4 controllers and best-in-class security, including Apple's latest Secure Enclave, hardware-verified secure boot and runtime anti-exploitation technologies.
macOS and Apps Scale Up to M1 Ultra
Deep integration between hardware and software has always been at the heart of the Mac experience. macOS Monterey has been designed for Apple silicon, taking advantage of M1 Ultra's huge increases in CPU, GPU and memory bandwidth. Developer technologies like Metal let apps take full advantage of the new chip, and optimisations in Core ML utilise the new 32-core Neural Engine, so machine learning models run faster than ever.
Users have access to the largest collection of apps ever for Mac, including iPhone and iPad apps that can now run on Mac, and Universal apps that unlock the full power of the M1 family of chips. Apps that have not yet been updated to Universal will run seamlessly with Apple's Rosetta 2 technology.
Another Leap Forward in the Transition to Apple Silicon
Apple has introduced Apple silicon to nearly every Mac in the current line-up, and each new chip — M1, M1 Pro, M1 Max and now M1 Ultra — unleashes amazing capabilities for the Mac. M1 Ultra completes the M1 family of chips, powering the all-new Mac Studio, a high-performance desktop system with a re-imagined compact design made possible by the industry-leading performance per watt of Apple silicon.
Apple Silicon and the Environment
The energy efficiency of Apple's custom silicon helps Mac Studio use less power over its lifetime. In fact, while delivering extraordinary performance, Mac Studio consumes up to 1,000 kilowatt-hours less energy than that of a high-end PC desktop over the course of a year.
Today, Apple is carbon-neutral for global corporate operations, and by 2030, plans to have net-zero climate impact across the entire business, which includes manufacturing supply chains and all product life cycles. This means that every chip Apple creates, from design to manufacturing, will be 100 per cent carbon-neutral.
122 Comments on Apple Unveils M1 Ultra, the World's Most Powerful Chip For a Personal Computer
So again, I'm not saying that Apple doesn't have a solid offering here, only that their claim that it's the "World's Most Powerful Chip For a Personal Computer" is a flat-out deliberate lie, and they KNOW it.
Why are you defending what amounts to deliberate false advertising, IE a lie?Did you actually click the link they provided? Hmm?? Click the link and READ the words, don't just look at the pictures. Context is important.
However, I'd have to agree with @lexluthermiester here, the whole "Most Powerful CPU in a PC" claim smells of bullshit. I've said the same thing about Intel with their Alder Lake stuff. Sure, it may very well be some powerful hardware but like with Intel chips, the type of work matters.
Apple has stuffed those chips with highly custom silicon that's custom-made to do certain tasks and yes, there's no doubt that that custom-silicon can and will beat anything that's general purpose when used in certain use cases. Hence me talking about as time goes on, we're going to see more and more custom-made stuff even in PCs as we continue to see diminishing returns on higher core counts and clock speed.
However, when you put those M1 chips in a match head-to-head on every day jobs they'll probably be on par with their Intel and AMD counterparts besides the battery life department which we can all agree, Apple beats the snot out of AMD and Intel in this situation.
Honestly, if PC hardware prices don't start showing signs of improving any time soon, I may be in the market to get a plain Mac Mini. Why? I just don't see myself gaming anymore, not with the price of hardware lately which is absolutely hideous. That and how I want to get away from Windows which has been an unmitigated dumpster fire as of late. And no, Linux isn't the answer. MacOS is pretty close to being perfect in terms of usability and having UNIX roots.
Now I own a PC and not a Mac, but I have used Macs a ton in the past, especially when I was in school, and I used to run macOS on my PC before Apple killed off support for NVIDIA's web drivers. Macs are very good at a lot of things, not just "one job", and they tend to be a lot more power efficient than PCs with CPUs based on the X86 architecture due to the lighter instruction set architecture of ARM.I've been following M1 for a long time, incl. reading and watching reviews and looking at real world performance. Aside from Alder Lake, the M1 Ultra outperforms CPUs from both Intel and AMD, and has higher multicore performance than the 12900K, at least based on benchmarks. Single core is behind that of most Alder Lake CPUs as well, but M1-based SoCs are still really powerful for what they are.
postimg.cc/HJ14qczF
My claim is based on factual information and has merit. The benchmarks done so far do not and can not support Apples claim.
So once again, if Apple were to have claimed that they have the most powerful SOC in the world, that claim, worded in that way, would have merit and be believable. However, their statement, as worded, is baseless and patently false. It is a deliberate and laughable lie.
And then you have people like me that, I'll admit, I do like Apple hardware for what it can do but you'll never see me worshiping at the altar of Steve Jobs. :laugh:
Apple M1Ultra 20core
browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/13345054
Here is a the 16c/32t Ryzen TR 3955WX;
browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/13364853
And here is the 32c/64t Ryzen TR 3975WX
browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/13173781
And the 64c/128t Ryzen TR 3995WX
browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/13296365
M1Ultra competes with AMD's offerings upto the 16core model but once we jump to the next model Ryzen cleans Apples clock. As AMD doesn't offer a 20c/40t model it leaves us looking for the average between those offerings. However, Intel does offer 20core model Xeons.
Intel Xeon Silver 4316 Workstation CPU
browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/12666256
Intel Xeon Gold 5320 Server CPU
browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/12452334
In these cases, Apple has an edge in the single core performance, but they in no way have the edge in multi threaded performance, but they in no way have the edge in multi threaded performance against either AMD or Intel.
Edit; As a another user pointed out, it seems the Xeon links were to dual CPU systems. Servers, not Workstations. My bad. Still, both AMD and Intel have CPU that beat out this "wonder" chip from Apple
So once again, their claim is fraudulent.
The Ryzen 9 5950X and Core i9 11900K are decidedly non-mobile parts.
No, there are no workstation CPUs in those charts, but the comparison includes the fastest desktop CPUs at the time, and the M1 beats one outright and ties with the other. For MT performance the story is a bit different as the integer performance is mostly par for the course with 8 core competitors (5800X), but FP performance is in another league entirely, beating even the 5950X.
If this is your argumentthen ... let's see:I don't see how any of this supports this somehow being only compared to mobile chips, or otherwise not competitive in any way. ADL has been launched later, with significant IPC improvements which surpasses both AMD's best and the M1:
Source.
In MT, the M1 Max (8 P-cores) is still competitive in FP with the 16c32t 5950X and the 16c24t 12900K, but falls behind in integer operations.
To be clear: nobody here is claiming that Apple's M1 SoCs are the fastest CPUs out there, bar none, period, in every use case. Nobody is saying that, or anything remotely close to that. What people seem to be arguing, and what I'm saying, is that they are highly competitive in a relatively broad range of applications (at staggering levels of efficiency) and blow the competition out of the water in a certain selection of workloads as well as in power efficiency. There are absolutely situations in which they lose outright - there's no way an 8P+2E CPU can beat, for example, a 32P (64t) competitor with even halfway decent IPC and clocks if the workload scales well in parallel. But what Apple are achieving with their chips is nonetheless highly impressive, and crucially, they aren't even comparing themselves to those chips.It's marketing. The caveats are always there - from their perspective, it is true, as for them their benchmarks and use cases are what matters. That doesn't mean it's universally true, and it should never be treated as such, but you're going way too far in the negative here, presenting the actual, real-world performance of these chips as worse than it actually is.That ... I guess explains a lot? Jobs might have had strokes of brilliance, but he mainly was a megalomaniacal proto-fascist who routinely abused his employees and made tons of mistakes. A lot if not most of his success rests on the cult of personality he accrued through his career, as that helped hype up the successes and minimize the failures. The most "great" thing about Jobs was luck, timing and circumstance: having a few good ideas at a time and place where he could (and with the material means to) realize them; coming back to Apple as they were about to go under and doing an okay job; seeing and seizing a few specific (but hardly unique) opportunities in the early 2000s. Few of his ideas were unique, he was first to few of his ideas, but he had the force of personality and lack of care for the people surrounding him to force his will through at the right moments. If that's "greatness" to you, then I would really suggest you reconsider some of your values. Abusers do not deserve reverence, no matter what they nominally achieve on the backs of their victims. You're buying into the absolutely worst aspect of Apple PR with this view.The problem is: they aren't. They're being extremely selective with their wording, contextualizing everything and making sure that everythign has several variables - performance at X power; relative performance at X power, etc. Most statements include a relatively specific workload. They list extensive comparison notes, including comparison CPUs, at the bottom of the Mac Studio page. They do mix and match things, at times comparing to the 12900K, at times comparing to previous Intel Mac SKUs (Mac Pro, iMac Pro), etc. Of course they're selective too: they compare only to a 16-core Mac Pro, despite it going to 28 cores. They're also milking architectural differences to make themselves look good - their 10c comparison in their launch video is against a 6P+4E 12600K ("similar MT performance at 65% less power"). But their statements are very carefully couched to make them defensible. They say things like "M1 Ultra Provides industry leading desktop-class performance and power efficiency". Not HEDT; not workstation; not performance alone: desktop-class, and performance and efficiency. That is a defensible statement; but it borders close on not being one, and is easily misread as saying more than it does. You can absolutely critique them for their benchmarks being selective, their comparisons being selective, etc. And I mostly agree. But they aren't wrong.
Here's the issue: you're taking your knowledge of actual reality and applying it to Apple's statements while ignoring the caveats included in them. That undermines your critique, and makes your claims of them "blatantly lying" false: you're skipping over every reservation and caveat made. If someone tells you their Fiat Panda is the fastest car on their block, and nobody else on their block even owns a car, critiquing them for not comparing it to a Ferrari or for not pointing that out is missing the point. In a way, you're not wrong: you're reading what they want you to read - that this is the most powerful computer ever. But you're not reading what they're actually saying, which isn't that. Hence you're actually falling for their PR spin while being critical of it, which not only renders your critique a poor fit but ultimately helps them. What would be accurate would be to acknowledge that what they are achieving in those specific comparisons is impressive (which it is), but that the comparisons are selective and not representative of the whole truth. Instead, you're making nonsense claims like they're saying this is the most powerful CPU ever (they never do) and that they're outright lying (again, not true).
Thus you're rendering your critique ineffectual and making yourself come off as ideologically biased against Apple, entrenching dumb tech tribalism and hampering any useful discussion. This helps Apple, by painting PC users as reactionary naysayers refusing to acknowledge the qualities of their products; it helps build a perception of progressiveness and superiority on their part. Don't be a marketing tool for Apple, please.
With that said, are Apple's claims a bit on sensational side and questionable at best? Sure. However that doesn't negate how much of a beast that this SoC is and there are benchmarks as @Valantar as pointed out in great detail to show the areas that this SoC excels with (and it's quite a bit.) At the end of the day, I probably wouldn't buy one of these and I do use Apple products, however it's still an impressive achievement, that's for sure.