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Mac Using AMD??

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16 minutes ago, DrMacintosh said:

The 13" MBP would benefit a lot from a Ryzen Mobile APU. Though I don't think Apple would be too thrilled with having AMD chips for the 13" models and Intel chips for the 16" models. 

Wouldnt be an issue. They will change over each product class when they do a new refresh. 

I just want to sit back and watch the world burn. 

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9 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

Wouldnt be an issue. They will change over each product class when they do a new refresh. 

I don't know if they could. Intel still has the lead for high core count mobile chips. 

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3 minutes ago, DrMacintosh said:

I don't know if they could. Intel still has the lead for high core count mobile chips. 

I recon if apple asked AMD would be able to deliver. Since apple dont have that many diffrent laptops the volume of sales for each product line is much much higher than any other brand. So if apple were to go AMD for MBP 16 that would be more mobile chips than all the other AMD laptops combined.

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25 minutes ago, hishnash said:

I recon if apple asked AMD would be able to deliver. Since apple dont have that many diffrent laptops the volume of sales for each product line is much much higher than any other brand. So if apple were to go AMD for MBP 16 that would be more mobile chips than all the other AMD laptops combined.

But AMD doesn't actually make the chips. TSMC does. And Apple already contracts them for making their mobile processors (I believe Samsung is a second supplier, but given Samsung is a bit behind, they're probably only used for lesser SoCs if any)

 

Also the APUs are still monolithic:

ENoXP5nUYAAmpei.jpg

 

So AMD can't even leverage chiplets for this.

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57 minutes ago, Mira Yurizaki said:

But AMD doesn't actually make the chips. TSMC does. And Apple already contracts them for making their mobile processors (I believe Samsung is a second supplier, but given Samsung is a bit behind, they're probably only used for lesser SoCs if any)

 

Also the APUs are still monolithic:

ENoXP5nUYAAmpei.jpg

 

So AMD can't even leverage chiplets for this.

of course AMD can leverage chiplets for this if they want to. AMD using the same manufacturer as apple is also a benefit for apple since if apple want to they can use their buying power (much more powerfull than AMD) to get more time on the line. 

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1 hour ago, hishnash said:

of course AMD can leverage chiplets for this if they want to. AMD using the same manufacturer as apple is also a benefit for apple since if apple want to they can use their buying power (much more powerfull than AMD) to get more time on the line. 

I don't think it works that way, that Apple can make someone else's chip without some negotiation through the owner of the IP. Otherwise other companies could just ask for Apple's A series SoCs.

 

And the thing with leveraging chiplets is yes, they can make it. But their current APUs are not designed as MCM processors. They'd have to make an entirely new design which doesn't really make sense when they should be leveraging what they have. Apple would have to fork over the money for that, which I bet they won't unless they make AMD also fork over the manufacturing rights for that SKU, because Apple.

 

EDIT: I think I misread about getting more time on the line, but I don't think that would be beneficial to Apple. Apple has a massive volume of chips it needs to make and setting it aside for a market that's not quite as large as their mobile market isn't good for that. It may also cause internal conflicts.

 

Unless Apple can have a second supplier up to speed to make all of the mobile hardware it needs, cutting into it to make room for another doesn't seem like a good idea.

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1 hour ago, Mira Yurizaki said:

Unless Apple can have a second supplier up to speed to make all of the mobile hardware it needs, cutting into it to make room for another doesn't seem like a good idea.

They had a second supplier. Then them and Samsung got sue happy and had a falling out much like how they did with Nvidia. 

I just want to sit back and watch the world burn. 

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2 hours ago, Mira Yurizaki said:

EDIT: I think I misread about getting more time on the line, but I don't think that would be beneficial to Apple. Apple has a massive volume of chips it needs to make and setting it aside for a market that's not quite as large as their mobile market isn't good for that. It may also cause internal conflicts.

Apples chip volume for second half 2020 will be mostly 5nm but zen is still 7nm so those are different machines on the production line. That said your right apple are also still going to be making 7nm chips since they will continue to sell the older phone but not in the same volume 

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7 minutes ago, hishnash said:

Apples chip volume for second half 2020 will be mostly 5nm but zen is still 7nm so those are different machines on the production line. That said your right apple are also still going to be making 7nm chips since they will continue to sell the older phone but not in the same volume 

5nm?  This seems to be confusing phone stuff and desktop stuff.  I know of no desktop stuff that is 5nm.  I don’t know if any phone stuff either but I know nothing about phones so I assume it is phone stuff.

 

Does Apple actually do it’s own chip fab?

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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5 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

5nm?  This seems to be confusing phone stuff and desktop stuff.  I know of no desktop stuff that is 5nm.  I don’t know if any phone stuff either but I know nothing about phones so I assume it is phone stuff.

 

Does Apple actually do it’s own chip fab?

Yep and for TSMC apple have basically purchased 100% of their 5nm fab time.

Apple designs their own chips (like AMD) and have TSMC produce them. They are TSMC's largest client and if they asked TSMC for a little bit more 7nm fab time (to build some AMD cpus) they would get the time.

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9 minutes ago, hishnash said:

Yep and for TSMC apple have basically purchased 100% of their 5nm fab time.

Apple designs their own chips (like AMD) and have TSMC produce them. They are TSMC's largest client and if they asked TSMC for a little bit more 7nm fab time (to build some AMD cpus) they would get the time.

So this fab time is not apple’s own fab, but TSMC’s and is in Taiwan(?).  Apple is not a fabless chip designer, as they do own some fab(?) but these chips are not being done on their own fab but at TSMC.  For purposes of this 5nm stuff they are acting as a fabless designer.

wikipedia says the 5nm stuff TSMC is making for apple is a14 CPUs for iPhones.

 

My suspicion is they could only get that 7nm fab time if it was available to begin with.

Considering AMD’s delivery problems I suspect all 7nm stuff is already running full and flat out.

 

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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1 minute ago, Bombastinator said:

So this fab time is not apple’s own fab, but TSMC’s and is in Taiwan(?).  Apple is not a fabless chip designer, as they do own some fab(?) but these chips are not being done on their own fab but at TSMC.  For purposes of this 5nm stuff they are acting as a fabless designer.

wikipedia says the 5nm stuff TSMC is making for apple is a14 CPUs for iPhones.

 

My suspicion is they could only get that 7nm fab time if it was available to begin with.

Considering AMD’s delivery problems I suspect all 7nm stuff is already running full and flat out.

 

To my understadning Apple only designs chips. They are like AMD, they dont own any Fabs. 

I just want to sit back and watch the world burn. 

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1 minute ago, Donut417 said:

To my understadning Apple only designs chips. They are like AMD, they dont own any Fabs. 

This, apple have contracts with companies like TMSC, Samsung and Foxconn to make all their hardware.

Grammar and spelling is not indicative of intelligence/knowledge.  Not having the same opinion does not always mean lack of understanding.  

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16 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

To my understadning Apple only designs chips. They are like AMD, they dont own any Fabs. 

I was looking at fab ownership on Wikipedia.  They have bought some stuff.  It’s all pretty small though. Purchases were 2015-2017 mostly.  They bought toshiba’s nand stuff for one.  Nothing very large scale and nothing very low nm.

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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Just now, Bombastinator said:

I was looking at fab ownership on Wikipedia.  They have bought some stuff.  It’s all pretty small though. Purchases were 2015-2017 mostly.  They bought toshiba’s nand stuff for one.  Nothing very large scale and nothing very low nm.

Apple at one time was looking in to Fabs. Small scale might be used for testing. That being said, it costs shit tons of money to run a fab. Which is probably why they contract this out at the moment to industry leaders. Its no secret that Apple wants to control their supply chain and intergrate more and more under their own roof. There long game could be making their own chips to making their own SSD's and such. Who knows. 

I just want to sit back and watch the world burn. 

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On 2/9/2020 at 7:49 AM, hishnash said:

-

 

On 2/9/2020 at 7:49 AM, hishnash said:

-

 

On 2/9/2020 at 7:45 AM, hishnash said:

most of the cost of the macPro is not in the cpu but in the motherboard that would end up costly about the same. Through maybe due to having more PCIe lanes from the chip apple could drop the costly PLX PCIe switching pool chip they have on the board ( and the related traces)

Bruh did you just triple post?

✨FNIGE✨

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24 minutes ago, SlimyPython said:

 

 

Bruh did you just triple post?

Lol yer a browser extension i had lead to the `submit replay` button to missfire.. i could not find a way to delete these posts.

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35 minutes ago, hishnash said:

Lol yer a browser extension i had lead to the `submit replay` button to missfire.. i could not find a way to delete these posts.

oof, im sure reporting them as a double post usually gets them removed but I need verification for that

✨FNIGE✨

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Apple has used AMD GPUs exclusively for years, so there's a solid relationship to build on.  If rumours are true then the 4000 series mobile Ryzen chips are going to blow Intel out of the water, both in terms of performance and power usage (I am skeptical about the second point, but we'll see).  Apple is obsessed with thin-ness, battery life, and margins, so it would make sense if they were to switch to AMD.

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6 minutes ago, flipped_bit said:

Apple has used AMD GPUs exclusively for years, so there's a solid relationship to build on.  If rumours are true then the 4000 series mobile Ryzen chips are going to blow Intel out of the water, both in terms of performance and power usage (I am skeptical about the second point, but we'll see).  Apple is obsessed with thin-ness, battery life, and margins, so it would make sense if they were to switch to AMD.

The geometries make sense. I wouldn’t mind seeing it myself.  There are a bunch of other possible factors though.  Iirc someone above mentioned various reasons code wise that Apple might be stuck with intel for a while.  Could be other factors too.  Anything from contracts to procurement to who-knows-what.  If apple was as blind sided by the 3990x as everyone else was it could take a long time for them to switch.  If they could.  Be interesting if they weren’t and they’ve been working on stuff though.

Not a pro, not even very good.  I’m just old and have time currently.  Assuming I know a lot about computers can be a mistake.

 

Life is like a bowl of chocolates: there are all these little crinkly paper cups everywhere.

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22 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

code wise that Apple might be stuck with intel for a while. 

Code wise apple should not have any issues, they are build on the LLVM compiler stack and all of apples core libs have been cross platforms 64bit (x86/ARM) for a long time so running LLVM with optimisations for Zen (something AMD have been pushing into LLVM a lot in the last year) would not be an issue for them.

Also the move apple has made by asking developers (and them selves) to dynamically link in low level libs link their Accelerate framework mean apple already build custom version of this framework for each mac they ship. This lets developers make use of AVX512 etc were it exists without needing to explicitly program for it but also fallback to other optimised solution on systems that have alternatives. This api ecosystem and driver that pushes devs to adopt the `blessed` solution has come in from when apple merged with NextStep, it puts apple in a much better place for AMD optimisation than windows were most developers targeting accelerate features will end up statically linking in compiled optimised frameworks for one platform (even through MS offer a dynamic lib you can use).

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