Refreshed Apple Mac Studio Likely To Launch Soon With M4 Max and M3 Ultra SoCs, For Whatever Reason

[GGforever]

Apple's Mac Studio is in desperate need of a spec bump. The system is still powered by the M2-era SoCs, whereas the MacBook Pros are already two generations ahead. According to a fresh tidbit shared by comparatively reliable tipster Mark Gurman, Apple is set to announce a much-needed upgrade for the Mac Studio in the coming days, although the upgrade in question is sort of a confusing one. Basically, the report states that the Mac Studio will soon be available with the M4 Max, and the M3 Ultra SoCs - and that is not a typo. Apple apparently has not done the homework for an M4 Ultra chip, and will be shipping the Mac Studio with the M3 Ultra instead.

This is particularly confusing because the industry had widely believed that an M3 Ultra SoC never existed in the first place, and that Apple will be jumping straight to the M4 Ultra chip for the Mac Studio. What's even more confusing, is that Apple's 'Ultra' chips traditionally consisted of two 'Max' chips connected via the 'UltraFusion' die-to-die interconnect tech. However, the M3 Max simply does not have this feature, which means that whatever the M3 Ultra is set to be, it is likely that it won't be two M3 Max dies fused together. It will certainly be quite interesting to see how Apple manages to position the M3 Ultra, or whatever it is named, considering that the 'lower-tier' M4 Max SoC will undoubtedly have superior single-core performance. That said, the M4 Ultra is still in development, which, according to Mark Gurman, will be featured in the future Mac Pro revision, setting it apart from the Mac Studio.



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[kondamin]

I hope Gurman got his hands on a document with a typo for our and apples sake.
if it really is a m3 n3b product it’s either going to be a slightly larger max chip or apple will have wasted a huge amount of silicon getting good Chips on that node Which wil reflect in its price.

well I was wrong apparently, it is an m3 ultra. Weird.

 

[hsew]

The Studio and Pro are weird enough propositions as it is, using an SOC that is 2 generations old. But, it seems there is a market for this?

 

[DirtyDingusMcgee]

I've been asking if there was a market for apple desktop products for a while now. They must feel they sell enough of them. Like 95 percent of the mac users I know are all MacBook/Pro and Ipad/pro and Iphone users.....no desktops at all. I see very few mac desktops in the wild. Mostly graphic designers that have been using them forever, or it is the computer running a studio.

I'm not saying they don't offer a good desktop product. I am sure those $8000 mac studios run awesome (and Logic Pro is cool). But I feel like i see less and less reason to use Mac desktops from a software stand point. An $8000 mac and an $8000 dollar pc both run adobe really bad ass.

 

[Gigaherz]

Maya on a Mac? Name a less cost effective method to do 3D lol.

 

[Daven]

It has been launched. Up to six TB5 ports too. I feel that Apple will be discontinuing the Mac Pro soon; push workstation customers to the Studio and advertise expansion using TB instead of PCIe slots.